Connie, liked, disliked it, quickly got bored with it?

They're not something that stands up to hours of play, depending on the person you're playing with, but it is fun to run various pairings and see how badly your Halfling gets chopped up by the wraith creature.

I've played the fantasy versions, the Battle Tech versions, and the Ace of Aces version.

They're a good introduction to gaming for people, because they're simple and quick.

Interesting.

It turns out that a Japanese company licensed Lost Worlds from Flying Buffalo aka FBI, and has a series of 20 or so nice hardcover books, with the art done by name character designers. Downside of course that there are in Japanese, but there are sites that have translations of the books/character sheets.

FBI has sold some of them at gaming conventions, but I have been suggesting that they try anime/manga conventions. They tried it once a local con, but I have been asking if I could rep them at Otakon, the 2nd largest US anime con. Figure that would be a better representation of the interest in it than some local con in the Arizona area, far from the major US anime/manga con centers.

But despite them looking interesting, and having a feel for what might be interesting to anime/manga fans, I never actually have played Lost Worlds. Thought I would see what people thought...

Hard cover seems a bit excessive for the Lost Worlds game play, because you have to flip back and forth to choose your action, then to see the reaction of the other person. I don't know enough about the Japanese gaming world to figure out if they're aiming at an art thing or a game thing. Also, for effective game play, you need a pile of the books so you can have several different matches.

Yeah, it looks like the book retail in Japan for @$15, which isn't that bad, but not that cheap either. Considering some of the additional merchendise (model kits, a phone based version of the game) it is probably more an art thing (with a game attached)...

Quick quoting:

A rule is a function of [game] mechanics. A role is a function of theater. Rules frame interaction with the game, roles frame interaction with the players.

This got me thinking about role-playing games, and how they are also rule-playing games. And chess.

In chess, each player has 6 possible roles each move (pawn, rook, knight, bishop, queen, king). These are mostly perceived as rules (bishops can only move diagonally), but they are also roles, having to do with how each piece controls lanes on the board and supports or threatens other pieces.

That applies to games like D&D also. If I'm playing a cleric, I have to follow the system rules for cleric, which in turn direct the role I will play for my party.

But not totally - I can be a healer or a harmer, the player who increases the combat-readiness of the warfighter, or the warfighter himself.

And even if I'm a healer, I can play that character as a total dick, which will color both my character's relationships within the party, and possibly the outcome of the whole game (depending on what effect my dickitude has on the NPCs, etc).

D&D is overarchingly structured around combat. The vast majority of adventures are lost or won by combat. That makes it more like chess (which all mini wargames descend from); more focus on the rules/game system, less on the roles/theater. But those still have an effect; how great an effect is largely up to the gaming group, I think.

Anyway, I thought it was a neat way to build a spectrum of gaming. I'm all about the gray area.

I also enjoyed playing Ace of Aces, a similar kind of game about WWI biplane combat.

I used to LOVE playing Ace of Aces. I always meant to pick up a set, but never did.

I think they share the same designer but are not directly related, design wise.

Going back to the discussion about the 4E DMG, and its usefulness or lack thereof. There's an article on the WotC website about the design philosophy behind the DMG here: [link]

There are people out there who think the new DMG's fantastic, I personally (like others here) didn't get much out of the Role-Playing 101 sections. I actually found it more interesting reading about the designers' motivations for doing things the way they did. One quote in particular cught my eye:

t "The 3rd Edition Dungeonscape book included an extensive -- one might say exhaustive -- discussion of adventure setting, detailing the many kinds of dungeon rooms and features. Our first inclination in putting this section of the DMG together was to draw on that excellent material. Ultimately, though, I decided that it lacked focus, and it was too much information for the first DMG."

I expect future PHBs and MMs to be pretty similar in structure to the first ones (just with different classes, feats, monsters etc). Sounds like that may not be the case for the DMGs. (Which, good, I didn't really need one primer on role-playing, let alone several.)

Check this out: D&D origami. [link]

Joey Ramone Video Game Reviews - circa early 80s.